Straight to the point or all over the place

Retcon: 2014

I didn’t exactly made the list in the 2014, because i never saw a need to, before i got into a bad company of wannabe youtubers (most of which called it quits). I didn’t made them, because there is no one to see them and because i constantly consume more things from the old years and find more worthy entries. And i don’t want to regularly try to update them and failing all self-imposed release dates like YourMovieSucksDOTorg. Though i nevertheless want one for 2014 for these reasons:

Interactive

I didn’t actually play Far Cry 4 and not really intend to (in near decade for sure), but it has an alternative ending, which shows the difference between games and movies, even if it consists mostly of cutscenes. Octodad: Dadliest Catch is an absurdist comedy game, with original kinaesthetics. A lot of people complain that it is a frustration simulator, but i played it on a flightstick and it was a smooth ride. It’s nice, but i don’t know if only a flightstick makes it easy and fun. Xenonauts is an attempt at X-Com, which allows you to role-play scary spec-ops assault team from every movie, where they fall onto the protagonist’s head all wielding shields and guns with laser sights, throwing smoke (and other) grenades all over the place. I yet to finish or even be invested into Divinity: Original Sin, and i don’t think their co-op style is working, and it feels that the game is pointless without it. But still, i appreciate the effort, and a good turn-based combat, with so much agency is a rare sight. So, what was undeniably great this year?

Shovel Knight (but not Treasure Trove!) a nice, but not perfect game, which knows its limitations and feels good up to the boss rush battle.

Freedom Planet a Sonic-like game, which improved both the platforming parts and the boss parts, with very nice camp cut-scenes.

Legend of Grimrock II continuing the Diablo tradition of making sequels to mono-dungeon games semi-open-world, you are now roaming the whole island with distinct zones. On the one hand it has more variety, on the other it loses some of the focus and some of the required puzzles are so moon-logic cryptic that you can be reaching for the walk-through.

Bravadaa “comedic” game with simplistic art-style and surprising tactical depth in a very rare, almost unique genre. Absolute best game of the 2014.

Video

Firstly, some notable events. The Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie was finally released and it’s everything you wanted — the AVGN and the dudes in the cardboard costumes.Transformers: Age of Extinctionturned out to be much better than expected. Singham Returnsis very tame, much tamer than the Singham or, of course, the original tamil singams, it has very little action, but also it lacks very bad sidekicks and poor comedy, it’s probably the most western (read: stale) indian movie out of whole family. Now to the great stuff, and it turns out this was a very nice year.

Whiplash
Did you like the first part of the Full Metal Jacket? Well you can get an entire film out of that, and in the different setting.

The Lego Movie
Wow, it is a modern post-post-post-modernist (repostmodernist) movie, fitting the multi-level complexity, simultaneity and post-irony of the 201x.

Maleficent
An absolutely broken movie, which still has a lot to offer, in terms of breaking the disney mold, that is.

Snowpiercer
An action movie confined to the one post-apocalyptic totalitarian train.

Birdman
A kind of a fictional actor based on a real actor study in a guise of a character study. It has nice cinematography and sound design.

The Boxtrolls
Another semi-bizarre stop-motion movie from Laika. It’s not something definitely amazing, but also there is nothing wrong with it, unlike ParaNorman or Kubo, and the quality of the work is obvious.

Gone Girl
An absolutely horrifying paranoid male existential abuse-horror (though it can be seen unisex by abstraction).

John Wick
An action movie with near-perfect combat in realistic style.

The Book of Life
An animated film where the sheer quality of the picture far outweighs the weak writing.

Kingsman: The Secret Service
A stylish action movie with a fitting soundtrack for the topic.

Sonic Boom
A cartoon, which embraced the culture, the fanbase and the post-irony, without being cheap too often. It attempts to do action scenes, but they don’t matter in comparison to the quality of the comedic writing

DJ Snake, Lil Jon – Turn Down for What
Basically, this is the reason i just had to make this list.

Audio

Stitches – Brick In Yo Face
An attempt at a kind of a gangster rap, which can be immensely enjoyed post-ironically.

Сидоджи Дубоshit и Грязный Рамирес — Мереана Мордегард
While this list was in the baking, the original video was deleted from the official channel, so here is a re-upload. The absolute lyrical absurdism of their second song impressed most of the local scene, later they went international with the sheer skill.